


Supernova

by Medeafic



Series: Supernova [1]
Category: Star Trek RPF
Genre: Biting, Knifeplay, M/M, Masturbation, Mild D/s, Sado-Masochism, a lot of drinking, mentions of scratching, mentions of self-harm - cutting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-02-21
Updated: 2011-02-21
Packaged: 2017-10-15 20:40:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,589
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/164747
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Medeafic/pseuds/Medeafic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Zach has been in New York for a few weeks now, and Chris is finding it hard to cope.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Supernova

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first part in the sequel series to [Captain Spanky](http://archiveofourown.org/series/6446).
> 
> Thanks to LJers Engineroom for a discussion we had, which prompted a bunch of ideas; Gryffin_draco who read an earlier draft and made very helpful comments indeed, and Emmessann, who is the most patient and awesome beta in the whole world.

“I’m not doing it, absolutely not.”  Chris folds his arms stubbornly.

“Chris, she’s a nice girl.  Well, nice enough.  No kissing.  No hand-holding even!  All you’ll need to do is –”

“No.”  Chris glares at his publicist.  “I _hate_ doing it, you _know_ I hate doing it, I’m _not_ doing it.  Not anymore.”

“Look, this is what you pay me for.  If you don’t want to take my advice, that’s fine; I’m happy to take your money for nothing.  But it’s still my job to make these suggestions, even if you don’t like them.”  She shrugs, taps her pen rapidly on the desk.

Chris rubs his hands all over his face, frustrated.  “ _Zach_ doesn’t have to do this kind of shit,” he says stubbornly.

“So if Zach jumped off a bridge, huh?” his publicist snaps.  She tosses the pen down and Chris watches it roll.

“Look, I know you don’t like him, but –”

“Chris, I have no feelings either way about Mr. Quinto beyond the fact that your relationship with him hasn’t made my life any easier.”

“And here I thought you had a little voodoo doll of him.”

“Hell, why do you think he moved to New York?”  His publicist grins, but Chris glowers.  She rolls her eyes.  “Sweetheart, gay doesn’t pay.  You want Leo DiCaprio’s career, or you want Rupert Everett’s?” 

“There are other –”

“I swear to God, if you even _mention_ Neil Patrick Harris –”

Chris throws his hands up.  They’ve had this conversation too many times.  “I just don’t like being a liar.  Is that so hard to understand?”

“It’s not lying.  It’s _publicity_.  And,” she wheedles, “I’m sure Zach will understand.  He always does, right?  He’s very forgiving about this kind of thing.”

“You’re just saying that to try to convince me.”

“Has it worked?”

Some days Chris loves his job.  Other days he feels like he’s being ground up in the churning gears of the Hollywood Machine.

  
***

  
Zach _does_ understand every time, although Chris always feels like there’s an undercurrent of disappointment there.  It makes Chris want to point out that Zach isn’t exactly loud and proud either, but he doesn’t.  He can sense that’s a no-go area for Zach.  So in general, they don’t talk much about what they each have to do for the Machine.

Since Zach’s been gone, it’s been hard.  Missing Zach has somehow become his main hobby.  Chris goes to work, does his job, but doesn’t socialize with the cast much.  Even when he does, he feels like a wet blanket.  He still drags himself out to drinks or meals occasionally, thanks to friends like Zoë, and to his publicist, who is determined to get him photographed, even though he hates it.

They speak regularly on the phone, but it’s not the same.  Zach is not a big phone talker, and texts more than he calls.  And for the first few days Chris had to avoid Zach’s calls entirely, because he found it too difficult to cope with his voice divorced from hot flesh, dark eyes, sharp teeth.  They’ve tried video calls a few times, which are both better and worse.

There is one thing that keeps Chris feeling a little grounded: he’s religiously re-inked the sharpie ZQ on his ass every couple of days.  It’s the only physical connection on his body to Zach after the bruises fade and the cuts heal.  And besides, Zach keeps demanding photographs of it unexpectedly, trying to catch him out.  Chris tries his best to redraw exactly over the same lines, to keep Zach’s handwriting, but over the weeks the letters become more familiar, more his own work.

Sometimes he sits on the bed with Zach’s knife and thinks about cutting his own skin; argues with himself about whether it’s _really_ self-harm.  Is it any different to when Zach does it to him, after all?

Zach thinks it’s different.  When Chris asked his opinion, the phone line went silent for a full minute.

“Hello?” Chris asked eventually.

“Christopher, if you _ever_ do anything like that, I will remove that knife from your possession.”

Chris was inclined to argue that at least then he’d see Zach, but Zach sounded alarmed, so he didn’t tease.  “I’m not going to do anything stupid.”

“Anything stupid?  Jesus Christ.  Don’t do _anything at all_.  Promise me.”

“Stop talking to me like I’m an idiot!”

“ _Promise_ me.”

Chris promised, but they were snappish with each other for days afterwards.

Zach seems so far away these days and Chris misses him like crazy.  He misses the way he felt a spectrum of slightly-sore to Jesus- _ouch_ the mornings after he’d been with Zach, and he misses the marks and the bruises and the aches that reminded him, without a doubt, that he’d been aggressively fucked the night before.  He misses the pain, the unpredictability, the _fun_. 

He misses Zach.  More than he thought possible.  And instead of being able to just crawl into bed for three months and _miss Zach_ , his publicist expects him to go out and pretend to date the newest reality stars.

So he calls Zach that night, from a bar, after one drink too many.

“Are you hammered again?” Zach says, instead of hello.

“What?  No.  Well, maybe.  How did you know?”  Sometimes Zach is unnervingly perceptive.

“Because it’s midnight here, and you only call this late when you’re drunk.”

“Oh.  Right.  Sorry.  I didn’t look at the time.”

“You never do, apparently.”

Chris feels momentarily guilty.  Yeah, he’s done it a few times, but it’s not like it’s on purpose.  Not totally.

“So why are you drinking on a Wednesday night?” Zach asks tiredly.

“Because I want to, okay?  Jesus.  What are you, my mother?”

There’s a pause, and then Zach says, “ _You_ woke _me_ up.  Why are you getting mad at me?”

“I’m not.”  Chris signals the bartender for another drink.  He’ll definitely have to cab it home, leave his car here, but he doesn’t care.  “I saw my publicist today.”

“Still hates me?”  
   
“Yep.”

Zach laughs.

“It’s not fucking funny.  I have to make more _appearances_.  With girls.”

“You _have_ to, huh?”

Chris takes a long, long swig of his drink.  “Yeah, Zach.  I have to.  I’m not you, okay?  I’m not all Mr. _Mysterious_ Sexuality.”  He makes mysterious wiggly fingers in the air as though Zach can see them, but drops his hand when he catches the eye of the confused jock across the bar.  “That, according to my publicist, is not going to _work_ for me.”

“I’m not Mr. –”

“Yeah, actually, you really fucking are.”

“Chris,” Zach sighs, “why did you call me?”

“Because I wanted to talk to my boyfriend.”

“Oh, is that what this is?”

“Well, if you’re going to get all pissy about it, forget it.  Go back to sleep or whatever you were doing.”  Chris feels a little bad then, because, yeah.  He’s being kind of a tool.  But he’s also angry.  He’s tired of his publicist telling him what to do, where to go, what to say.  And he’s tired of Zach being in New York.

There’s a long hush on the line, and then Zach says, “Pine, go home.  Don’t sit at that bar all alone making yourself crazy and drunk.”

“Don’t _tell_ me what to do,” Chris hisses.  “We’re not in fucking _bed_ right now.”  He regrets it as soon as he says it, but Zach doesn’t rise to the bait.  In fact, his calmness is pretty infuriating.

“Alright.  Stay at the bar drinking, by all means.”

“I plan to.”

“Okay.  Enjoy yourself.”

“I will.”

“I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Whatever.”

“I love you.”

That’s not fair.  “Love you too,” Chris mumbles.

“Goodnight.”

It’s only later that Chris wonders how Zach knew he was alone at the bar. 

  
***

  
He calls Zach again on Saturday night when he gets home early from a club, where he had to be seen with some girl his publicist set him up with.  He has another drink at home before he calls, because he’s sobered up too much in the taxi.

“It’s two in the morning,” Zach grunts when he finally picks up.  No hello.

“Oh.  Right.  I didn’t look at the time, I guess.  I’ve been out.”

“Why are you always drunk when you call me these days?”  Zach is sighing and yawning at the same time, and he doesn’t sound happy.

“I’m not drunk.  Not _drunk_ drunk, anyway.”

“You’re drunk enough.  Seriously, Chris, I have to get up early, so –”

“I _miss_ you, okay?  I’m sorry I actually _give_ a shit.”  Silence.  “Forget it,” Chris snaps.  Okay, maybe he’s a bit drunker than he thought.  “Sorry I fucking _woke_ you.”

“I miss you too,” Zach says, but the careful way he says it is incredibly irritating.  “I know it’s hard.”

“You have no fucking idea, Zach.  No _fucking_ idea how hard it is.”  Yeah, he’s probably drunk, because he doesn’t usually swear so much.  Or so emphatically.

“So tell me,” Zach says.  “Tell me.”

“This sucks,” Chris says heavily.

“Yeah.  Sucks a lot.”

Chris can hear Zach breathing, like the phone is too close to his mouth.  He can picture him, still sleepy, phone stuck between the pillow and his face.

“ _Talk_ to me,” Chris says.  “I miss you.”  _Make me feel better_ , he thinks.

“I –” Zach cuts himself off with a yawn, but Chris can hear every possibility.  _I have to get up in a few hours.  I don’t have time for this.  I don’t have anything to talk about_.  “I miss you too.  I hate being away from you.  I want you to come see me.”

“Oh.  I, uh.  I can’t right now.”  Chris can feel his moral high ground crumbling away.  “I have to finish filming.”

“Then what exactly do you want me to do?”

Chris feels his anger growing again, and it’s wild and hot and incandescent like he’s going to explode with it.  “Do whatever you want,” he says.  And before he can stop himself: “You always do.”

“What?  I – _what_?  Yeah, okay.  I’m gonna go now.  Call me when you’re sober.” Zach hangs up.

Chris stares at his phone for a second, and then throws it across the room.  It cracks loudly into the wall and then thuds to the carpet.

  
***

  
When Chris wakes up, with a hollow aching head and a craving for bacon and eggs, he knows something is wrong.  It takes a minute to place the bad feeling.  It’s not just Zach being away, he did something, said something…oh.  Oh, fuck.

He raises himself limply on one elbow to confirm: yeah, there’s his phone on the floor over there.  Broken.  He feels a hot rush of shame; if Zach knew, he’d be so disappointed in him.  And then everything he said to Zach last night comes back, and it makes him feel even queasier.

“When did you get so fucking dumb?” he asks himself.  “I mean, seriously.  Is it a genetic thing or did you just wake up stupider one day?”  He gets out of bed, dry-retches into the bathroom sink and turns on the shower as hot as he can stand it.

“You gotta stop this,” he says, water pouring into his mouth as he positions himself carefully under the showerhead.  “Stop.  Stop.”  It’s the same thing he gurgles into the water every morning after he’s drunk-dialed Zach, which is happening with scary regularity.  “No one likes a drunk.  Stop it.  Stop.”

When he gets out of the shower, he’s going to have to call Zach and crawl for forgiveness.  At the back of his mind, there’s the fear that this time Zach _won’t_ forgive the inebriated snarls, but…

That’s the thing about Zach.  He likes to have control during sex.  But Chris is pretty sure that most of the time, he’s the one with the upper hand outside the bedroom.  He’s better at relationship stuff.  He was getting _really_ good at being Zach’s boyfriend before he left.  And if Chris hasn’t done so great since then, well, it’s understandable.

In the bedroom, that’s Zach’s arena.  But they haven’t been in a bedroom together for weeks now. 

He shakes his head under the water, pictures skewed graphs representing the power flow, tries to figure out where the lines would go up and down, what each axis would be labeled.  He’s never been great at math.  So fuck math, he thinks about Zach instead, Zach holding him down over something, the kitchen counter will do, and making him say sorry for being such a brat.

He’s going to rub one out but thinking about Zach makes him remember last night; his dick dies in his hand and he feels sick again.

All in all, though, Chris is feeling pretty safe.  Like his publicist says, Zach’s the forgiving type.

The phone rings out to voice mail the first time he calls, but Chris persists, and Zach answers the second time. 

“Hey,” he says briefly.  “Can I call you back?  I’m in the middle of something.”

“Sure,” Chris says, and tries to tell him not to call the cell, but the line goes dead immediately, and he’s left thinking that actually, Zach just doesn’t want to talk to him right now.

  
***

  
It’s over two hours later when Zach calls back, and Chris is furious.  He’s been stuck at home waiting, since his cell is out of commission.  It’s his only day off this week, and he has shit to _do_.  Like buying a new goddamn cell phone. 

A half hour into waiting he decided, fuck Zach, he would just go out and get some grease to cure his hangover, but when it came down to it, he stayed slumped on the couch, watching a _Twilight Zone_ marathon, and feeling sorry for himself.

When the phone rings he’s all over it like a nervous kid waiting to hear back from a potential prom date.  “Hello?”

“Were you running?”

“No.”

“You sound out of breath.”  Zach sounds calm, collected, like usual.  “Why aren’t you answering your cell?”

“I – it’s broken.”

“Oh.  I see.”

Chris says nothing.

“So what did you want when you rang?” Zach asks, sounding impatient.

“I wanted to apologize,” Chris says, taken aback.  Usually Zach is a bit more, well, sad or conciliatory or _something_ after Chris gets angry at him.

Zach makes a snorty noise.  “Uh huh?”

“So, um.  Sorry?  About last night.”

“Right.”

“What’s wrong?”

“What’s wrong is, I’m tired of having the same conversation over and over and over again.  I feel like I’m in _Groundhog Day_.”

“Well – that’s a good movie.”

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

“It’s a classic!” Chris says, shocked.

“I _mean_ ,” Zach growls, “are you fucking _kidding_ me with this _shit_ you are pulling?”

Chris opens and closes his mouth a few times.  “What shit am I pulling?”

Zach’s voice is so angry that Chris wants to throw this phone at the wall too, so he doesn’t have to hear it, but he’s still ashamed of that temper flare, so he just listens.

“I’ve been really patient with you, you know?  But I am done with this stupid, drunk, mean, _obnoxious_ behavior.  Stop drinking or stop calling me when you do, but either way, _stop_ it.”

Chris feels his stomach clench on itself and he wishes really, really hard for a second that there was something in his belly so at least he could throw it up.  His head is pounding and he feels dizzy.  “I wasn’t – that’s not – it’s not like that.”

“What happened to your cell phone?”

“I – I threw it at the wall,” Chris admits.

“Of course you did,” Zach says, and the disappointment in his tone is actually physically painful for Chris.

“I’m sorry.”  He really, truly means it this time, but he doesn’t know if Zach will believe him, after what Chris suddenly realizes has been three weeks of trying to bait him and blame him and fight with him and then calling and apologizing the next day.  “I really am.  I’m just a bit crazy right now.”

There’s a long, long pause between them, snaking from LA to NYC and back again, broken only by car horns on Zach’s end and Chris’s shaky breathing on his own.

“I love you, Christopher, but – you’re pushing it.”  Zach sounds more neutral now.  “When I left, you told me you were okay with it.  You told me you _supported_ it.  But now, it’s like…because I want you so much, because I love you so much, you think you can get away with being a – a giant radiating _asshole_.”

The awful thing is, Zach is totally right, but Chris never expected to get called on it.  He bites into his hand, waits for some emotional control.  It’s excruciating to have his behavior reflected back so honestly. 

“You’re right.  I’m sorry,” Chris says eventually, his voice shaky.  “I’ll stop it.  I’ll get my head together.”

Zach lets out his breath, and when he speaks he sounds relieved.  “Look, I probably should’ve said something before now.”

“It’s not your fault,” Chris whispers. 

“No,” Zach agrees.  “But still.  I shouldn’t have let you get away with it for so long.”

And when Chris thinks about it, Zach never has let him get away with it before.  “Why _did_ you?” he asks.

“Same as I said before, Christopher.  Because I love you and I want you.  So, did you do that kind of shit to your girlfriends too, or am I the only one who’s had the pleasure?”  Zach is rapidly recovering his sense of humor.

“Uh,” Chris replies.  “I don’t know.  I’ll have to ask them.”  His face is still hot with embarrassment.  “I’m sorry, Zach.  What the fuck is _wrong_ with me?”

“I’m not sure,” Zach says, his voice light.  “Maybe you’re a congenital jerk?”

Chris opens his mouth to say something moderately smart-assed, but then it all starts to come bursting out.  “Sometimes it feels like people are expecting me to go right back to girls.  Like you were just an experiment or…or an _aberration_ , and I’m going to slink back to Pussytown now that you’re gone.  My publicist couldn’t stop smiling when you left.  People think we’re over now, and they act like it never meant anything at all.”

“Fuck them.  What do they know?  Besides, I hear Pussytown has really bad weather this time of year.”

Chris laughs weakly.

“Maybe you should go out with your friends more,” Zach suggests.

“I have been,” Chris tells him.  “Or trying to.  But I think some of them are avoiding me.”

“What do you mean?”

Chris is trying to think of a way to put it.  “Zoë, Sorel, Olivia – the girls, they’re all fine.  The married guys, they’re fine too.  But some of the other guys – I don’t think they’re totally comfortable with me anymore.”

It’s true, and it hurts.  Chris loves his female friends, he really does, and he loves his coupled-up friends and their kids and their stories.  But he could really do with some basic male bonding.  Some one-on-one down at the courts.  Or a night where he doesn’t have to play kid-friendly games and watch the swearing.

“Wow.  That’s really…wow,” Zach says.  “I’m sorry.  I didn’t know.”

“I don’t think it’s like – I mean, they don’t think I’m going to _jump_ them or anything.  I think they’re just confused about me.”  It could be true.  “Also, I haven’t seen some of them for a long time.  So maybe that’s it.”  Because when Zach was here, Chris spent all the free time he could with Zach, and he kind of forgot about everyone else.

“What about _our_ guys?”

Chris knows what he means.  “Karl’s not here.  John’s busy with the baby.  And Anton’s – popular.  He doesn’t have a lot of time.”

“Joe?”

“You know I can’t,” Chris replies shortly.  Joe reminds him too much of what’s missing.  “Not right now.”

“You could try hanging out with my friends in LA.”

“Are you _serious_?”

“Well–”

“First off, I _have_ my own friends; I don’t need yours.  And second, they hate me.”

“They don’t _all_ hate you.”

“Yeah.  Ringing endorsement there.  Look, my buddies, the ones avoiding me – they’ll get over it eventually.  I’ll keep calling them until they give in.”

“I’m sorry, Chris,” Zach says again, and he sounds upset.  But Chris is pretty sure Zach had it worse growing up.

“Eh,” Chris shrugs.  “Whatever, right?  That’s just how it is right now.  Things will change.”

Zach is quiet for a minute, and then says, “What did you mean when you said I always do what I want?”

Oh, fuck.  Chris feels a horrible heat spreading up his chest, neck, face, to the tip of his ears.  “I – nothing.  I’m sorry.  I was just mad at you.”

“Did you mean,” Zach asks carefully, like he thinks he’s about to get his heart broken, “the stuff we do during sex?”

“No!”  Chris sits bolt upright, and feels like he might throw up again.  If there’s one thing he _never_ wanted to do it's make Zach feel uncomfortable about that.  “No.  _God_ , no.  No, _never_.  Never ever.  I _love_ that stuff.  You know that.  Jesus, _no_.  I –”

“Okay, Christopher.  I get the feeling you're trying to tell me _no_ ,” Zach says calmly.  “So if it wasn’t that, what _did_ you mean?”

Chris swallows, stares at the window.  His blinds are still down and the room is dim.  He hasn’t taken the trash out for a while, and he should get on that.  He hasn’t changed his bed sheets in way too long and he has laundry to do.  The dishwasher to unpack.  A million things run through his mind, because this is not a conversation he wants to have. 

“Christopher,” Zach says quietly.  "Honesty Policy.  Answer me, please."

Damn him.  “I just wish you were here,” Chris replies.  “I wish you hadn’t left.  But I can’t say that because it’ll make you feel bad.  And now I _have_ said it, and I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have –”

“Stop,” Zach says abruptly, and Chris does.  “You can say anything to me, you should know that.”  Chris sighs.  “It _does_ make me feel bad,” Zach admits.  “But that doesn’t mean you can’t say it.  I mean, _I_ feel bad about it too.”

“Really?” Chris says blankly.  “But you love New York.”

“Yeah.  But I miss you.  And I’m worried about you.”

“You don’t have to worry.  I said I’d stop acting like that.”

“It’s not just that.  You’ve been drinking, a lot.  You’re isolated.  You thought about _cutting_ yourself.  And I’m supposed to not worry?”

“When you put it like _that_ –”

“How else am I supposed to put it?”  Zach sounds so sad that Chris doesn’t know what to say anymore.  “I never wanted this for you.  I want you to be happy.”  They fall silent again.

Chris stands up and opens the blind, letting in the light.  Damn.  His apartment _definitely_ needs cleaning.  After a while, he says, “You were right.  What you said before was right.  I felt like I could do whatever, and you would put up with it.  And I really am sorry about that.  Total dick move.  But – I’m not doing it just because I’m, what did you call me-”

“A giant radiating asshole,” Zach supplies.

Chris grins despite himself.  “Yeah.  A supernova asshole.”

“So are you going to tell me, or do I have to start guessing?”  But Zach sounds intrigued now, less sad.  It’s progress at least.

Chris shifts around on the couch, lies down, tries to get comfortable.  His head aches less if he’s horizontal.  “I feel lost.  All that stuff we did, it’s all suddenly stopped and I feel out of control.  I can’t get my head together some days.  Like…I don’t know.  Like I really _am_ going to go supernova.”

“Oh.  Of _course_.”  Zach sounds like he’s unexpectedly discovered El Dorado.  “I’m such an idiot, I – wait, hang on a second.  Let me get off the street.”

“Where _are_ you?”

“Wandering aimlessly down the sidewalk.  I went outside to call so I wouldn’t be tempted to totally lose it at you.  Let me call you back in ten.”

“Don’t leave it two hours this time.”

Zach has the grace to sound rueful.  “Yeah.  You’re not the only one making dick moves.  Sorry.  I’ll call you right back.  I promise.”

He’s as good as his word, almost to the second, not that Chris has a stopwatch or anything, he just _happened_ to note the time.  He pops a couple more Tylenol while he waits.  Just after he curls up on the bed, trying to get comfortable, the phone rings again.

“So here’s the thing,” Zach says without preamble.  “That’s my fault.  The feeling lost thing.  I should have thought about it more in advance.”

“It is?  You should?”  Chris is still stuck in his own head on being the asshole in this situation, so Zach starting to shoulder some blame for – anything, really – is weird.

“Well, yeah.  I didn’t mean to fuck with your head like that.  But when it goes from intense to zero, it’s difficult.”

“How do _you_ know?” Chris asks skeptically.

“How do you think?” Zach asks back.

Chris ponders for a while; his head is sore, so it’s hard.  Finally he gets it.  “You feel it too.”

“Yeah.  But I haven’t wanted to say anything because…”

Chris sits up abruptly, ignoring the pain.  “Because?”

Zach takes a deep breath.  “You know I don’t really do that stuff outside of…well.  I don’t like to blur the lines like that.  So, I just figured…but I guess these are special circumstances…you know?”

“Dude, I do _not_ know.  I have a hangover the size of Manhattan.  I think I broke my _brain_ last night.  Just lay it out for me, or we’ll be talking in circles for days.”

“Well, that part is definitely your own fault.  You need to stop –”

“Drinking, yeah, I know.  Believe me, I got the memo from my liver too.  No more.”  Chris flops back on the bed again.

“Good boy,” Zach says approvingly, and Chris feels his dick twitch.  Goddamn.  He hasn’t heard Zach sound like that since…

“Uh,” Chris says.  “So.  Anyway.  What were you were saying?”

But Zach doesn’t answer his question.  “You haven’t sent me a picture for a while.  Of the mark I left on you.”

Chris makes a noise that comes out as _gnnh_.  There’s definite interest in his pants now, and he has to shift to get comfortable in his jeans.  He clears his throat and tries again.  “Yeah.  It’s been a few days.”  He’s not entirely sure where this is going, but he likes it.

“And now you’ve broken your cell in a temper tantrum.”

“Yeah.”  Chris clenches his teeth, feels a hot thread run from Zach’s mouth in New York through the phone line to LA, make a circle through his mind and then shoot down to his crotch.  “Well.  I’m still doing what you told me to do with the sharpie.”

“But how can I really _know_ that?”  Zach is practically purring now, and Chris starts tugging at his jeans, trying to unbutton his fly with uncooperative fingers.  “The only camera you _had_ was in that phone.”

“I’ll go get a new phone this afternoon.  Send you a picture then,” Chris offers, and he’s aware of his own breathing, coming faster now.

“Get your hand off your crotch,” Zach says, sounding amused but also – oh, fuck, it’s that voice he uses in the bedroom.

“Okay.”

“Don’t touch yourself until I say you can.”

“I won’t,” Chris says, hoping for another _Good boy_ or maybe even a –

“You’re being beautifully obedient, Christopher.”

Chris groans.  Yeah.  That’ll do it. 

They’ve tried the phone sex thing before, of course, and Zach has watched Chris over video calls a few times, but this is different.  This is Zach really being Zach, acting like he does when he’s standing in front of Chris in the flesh, watching him undress, telling him to stand up against the wall or to bend over and put his hands flat on the bed or –

“Hey,” Zach says, and his voice is all gravelly.  “Are you still with me?”

“Yeah,” Chris says, with a laugh.  He’s clutching at his thigh, his palm all sweaty.  “Yeah, I am.”  His dick is begging for attention, but he has no intention of doing anything without permission.  “ _Jesus_ , Zach,” he breathes.

“What?”

“Why the fuck didn’t you do the phone sex like this sooner?”

“You want to talk about that, or you want to get off?”

“Get off, get off!” Chris says frantically, before Zach can rescind the offer, and he’s rewarded by Zach’s warm chuckle down the line.

“You’re so well-trained.  Such a good boy.  You jerk off today yet?”

“No.  I’d be delighted to right now, though.”

“I don’t think so,” Zach says thoughtfully, and Chris squirms.  “Not yet.  But – I think I’m going to.  Yeah.”  They both pause at Chris’s involuntary noise of protest.  “Did you have something you wanted to add?”

“No,” Chris says, biting at his lip.  “No.  Whatever you say.”

“Yeah, whatever I say,” Zach agrees.  “I miss seeing you all agreeable and compliant, Christopher.  I think about it a lot.” 

“ _Zach_.  Seriously.  Let me.”

Zach laughs, a little breathless.  “No.  Talk to me.  Tell me what you thought about last time you came.” 

Chris can hear now that his voice is slightly uneven, and it hits him right in the core of his cock, because Zach rarely loses any kind of control when they’re together.  He’s restrained in his movements when he has to be, and keeps everything in check, because if he doesn’t, if he makes a mistake, if something goes wrong –

“ _Christopher_ ,” Zach says again.  “Talk.”

“It’s _you_ ,” Chris gasps.  “Fuck, Zach, I always think about you.”  And he starts talking.  About the time Zach used needles to pinprick shallow circles around his nipples and made Chris hold off his orgasm while he licked at the blood.  The time Zach clawed scratch marks that didn’t fade for a week, and Chris came so hard that he bit his own tongue and left a bloody mouth print on the pillow.  The time Zach cut him with the knife and the whole room stank of sweat and blood and come –

When Chris hears Zach make that noise he makes when he shoots, it goes right through him, and he’s shaking, sweating out the hangover, his shoulders aching with the need to feel Zach biting down on them.

“Me now?” Chris pants hopefully.

“No,” Zach says, his voice all blissful.  “No.  Not yet.  You can wait, Christopher."  Chris can hear him shifting around and giving a satisfied sigh.  "So much blood on your mind these days.  Why is that?”

“You’re a bad influence.  Come on.  Let me.”

“I must be.  And no.  Not yet.”

“ _Zach_ ,” Chris says, and even he is surprised by the urgency in his tone.

“Are you desperate for it?”

“ _Yes_ , Jesus, fuck, please.”

“I don’t think you’re desperate.  If you were desperate, you’d be begging me for permission.”

Chris wants to roar, _I AM begging, you fucker!_ but what comes out of his mouth instead is a series of pleading words and phrases that he’s learned Zach likes to hear; the things he’s found that Zach can’t resist.  And it still works, even like this, physically disconnected.

“Okay,” Zach says, and Chris is thrilled to hear the quiver in his tone.  “Alright.  You can touch yourself now.  But Christopher – don’t go under.  I don’t want you to slip away from me.”  Zach’s voice goes so serious that Chris’s spit-slicked hand stops in mid-air over his dick.  He hasn’t gone in to that head space since Zach left, and he doesn’t know if he really _could_ , without Zach right there with him.

“I won’t.”  Even if he did, he wouldn’t be slipping away.  It’s Zach who anchors him, guides him.  But whatever Zach wants right now, Zach can have.

Zach instructs Chris how to jack himself with an exactness born of detailed observation.  How fast, how tight, when to flick a thumb over the head, when to scratch lightly down the underside, when to rub at his balls – “And don’t you dare come without permission,” he snaps after a few minutes.  Chris is already on the edge, but Zach takes him there and back a few times until it’s too much.

“Zach, come _on_.  I’m gonna _explode_.  Let me.”

“No.  Not yet.  Get the lube and fuck your fingers for me; you always sound so good.”  Chris makes a strangled noise.  “Yeah, it usually goes something like that.  Go on.  Do that and I’ll let you come.”

Chris scrabbles for the lube lying on the nightstand.  He doesn’t usually bother with his ass much when he’s on his own, but Zach likes watching it when they’re together, and hearing it too apparently.  “Can’t do everything at once with the phone as well,” he complains.  “Can I put you on speaker?”

“No.  I want you breathing right into it like you are now.  Just roll over like a good boy and put the phone between your ear and the pillow.”

“Jesus.  Yeah.  Okay.  Sure.”  Zach’s right.  Speaker phone suddenly seems incredibly impersonal. 

Chris twists his body and it’s surprisingly comfortable, half on his stomach, his cock butting into the comforter as it fucks through his fist, and easy access to his asshole for the other hand.  The phone is cool against his cheek and having it pushed right up against his ear like this makes Zach’s uneven breathing come through clearly.  Speaker phone?  What in the hell was he thinking?

“Go on,” Zach says.  “Like it’s me doing it to you.  How would I do it, if I were there?”

That depends on Zach’s frame of mind, but in this kind of mood, Chris knows how it would be.  “You would do it quick,” he grunts.  “Hard.  Make me come before I expected it.”

“Yeah, I would,” Zach says, and Chris can picture his lazy, one-sided smirk.  “Do it like that.  I won’t tease you anymore, I promise.  I’ll let you come when you ask me.”

Zach is right, damn him, about the noise Chris makes when he pushes his fingers into his ass – less accommodating now than when Zach was regularly fucking it – but Chris really _is_ too desperate to feel self-conscious.  It only takes a couple of well-placed thrusts and a few squeezes at his cock before he’s ready to blow and tries to tell Zach.

“Go on then, Christopher,” Zach says, sounding amused.  “Go supernova for me.”

And that’s exactly what Chris feels like, his vision flickering before he squeezes his eyes shut, his fingers curling inside and tight over his dick.  He’s shaking all over and, thank God, the last of the hangover seems to flood out with his come, and afterwards he feels ten times better, but ten times more exhausted.

  
***

  
“So here’s the deal,” Zach says, when Chris has had a little bit of recovery time and burrowed under the comforter.  He’ll have to wash it later, along with his sheets, now that he’s jizzed all over it and wiped his fingers on it, but he doesn’t care.  Zach sounds almost business-like, and it makes Chris smile.  “It was stupid of me not to realize you’d be affected by suddenly stopping everything.  This…we were never supposed to be – we never _were_ a 24/7 thing, but still.  I should have realized, just stopping everything like that was going to be difficult.  I’m sorry.  I didn’t think it through.”

“Okay,” Chris says.  “I’m sorry too.  Really.”

“Christopher – I don’t _want_ a 24/7 thing.  You know that, right?”  Zach sounds cautious.

“Yeah.  I know.”  Chris _does_ know.  Zach has always been honest about that.  Early on, when he was researching kinks and sadomasochism and submission, Chris read about 24/7 relationships, but Zach has always been very negative about the idea.  No collars, no 'sirs', no permissions, no ownership.  They are boyfriends, who happen to have kinky sex.  Occasionally sex that requires time off work for recovery, or visits to the doctor.  But the kink does not extend outside sex. 

And Chris, he’s pretty sure that he doesn’t want anything 24/7 either.  It sounds like a lot of work, anyway.  And also: scary.  Scary in a way that being cut, whipped, bitten, spanked, _hurt_ is not scary.

“Hey.  I can hear your brain ticking over,” Zach tells him.

“I know you don’t want that.  It’s...just for the bedroom.  I know.”  Chris hopes really hard that he doesn’t sound disappointed.  Because he’s _not_ disappointed.  Not really.

“Yeah, or wherever we’re fucking,” Zach says casually.  “But here’s the thing.  Being away from each other – maybe it would help, a little, if we had some rules in place.  Just so we both felt…But we don’t have to.  Only if it helps.  And if it doesn’t work we can forget it.”

“I want to try,” Chris says, interested.  “We could try it.”

“Okay.  But – don’t go all weird on me, yeah?”

“As opposed to going all supernova asshole?”

“Oh, I think we’ve managed to get your supernova asshole under control,” Zach laughs.

“Not funny.”  But Zach is still chuckling to himself in delight.  “You tell the worst jokes, you know that?  Okay.  I won’t go weird.  What does that even mean?”

“You know.  All dependent.”  Zach is serious again.

“Dependent?”

“I don’t want you to give up your agency, Christopher.  I would never want that.”

“Is that what a 24/7 thing means to you?”

Zach starts to say something and then stops.  “I just don’t think it would be good for me,” he says eventually, and adds, “I mean, good for either of us.”

Chris wonders what that’s supposed to mean, but he lets it go for now.  Files it away for future reference.  “So what _do_ you want?  What is it that you want from me?”

“I just want _you_ , Christopher.  That’s all.”  His voice is so soft that Chris can barely hear him.

“And – when we do the stuff we do?  What do you want then?”

There’s a noise that sounds like Zach is rubbing his hand over his face, rasping over unshaven skin.  “I want…to know that you’re giving way to me, willingly, but I want to watch you struggle while you do it.”

“And?”

“I want to know every single part of you, inside and out.  I wish I could crawl right inside your skin and bury myself –”  He stops; Chris holds his breath.  “Well.  That’s the kind of thing I want.”

“You’re such a romantic at heart,” Chris grins.

“Is that what you think?” Zach asks, sounding strange.  “You think fear and blood and control are romantic?”

“I don’t see why they can’t be?”  There's still no reply, and Chris starts thinking he's been cut off.  “Zach?”

“I never really thought about it like that,” Zach says.

“Dude, you have _issues_ ,” Chris yawns.

“So I’ve been told,” Zach says, but he laughs again.  "Yeah.  So I've been told.  So listen, you sound tired.  We can talk about the rules another time, figure them out together.  But right now I think you should have a nap."

“Okay.”  Actually, it sounds like an awesome idea.  Chris feels exhausted, emotionally and physically.  “Yeah, I’ll do that.”  He yawns again, so wide his jaw cracks.  “I think…I think I’m all supernova'd out."

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Katie knows](https://archiveofourown.org/works/249184) by [Colourful](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Colourful/pseuds/Colourful)




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